# Homework



## DarkAura (Nov 24, 2011)

Does your school give too much homework? Not you college people, I'm talking about all the minors in public schools.

Did you know that homework has little effect on achievement? If you don't have homework, it doesn't make too much of a difference. Teachers think that homework prepares them for college, but homework has little effect.

So, does your school give out too much homework, or too little? (If this topic should be moved, then move it, seeing as this seemed like the best place to put this, but I'm not sure. =\)


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## bulbasaur (Nov 24, 2011)

Well, here's something I made for an English assignment. It touches upon this subject: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8_lrh2pnQs
(ironically, people think I'm the worst overachiever in the school)

But, um. If you're unlucky, the teachers of all six academic courses you take might give you homework on the same nights, and in that case, you're pretty much screwed. On the flip side, and this happens just as frequently, you'll get no homework at all for a few days.


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## Zero Moment (Nov 24, 2011)

If I didn't get to practice math in my Algebra II homework, I doubt I would understand how to even do the problems
So even though I'm all BLUUUUHH when I have to do my homework, if I never had any I'd never fully understand the subject


Although there are things that I'm like "wtf why are we doing this" in my English class. Last week, we had finished our big essay on To Kill A Mockingbird (uuugggghh), and were watching the movie in class for fun.
Next class?
BAM
Essay on the differences between the film and the novel.
And I wasn't paying attention to the movie, either. (I was reading...)


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## Autumn (Nov 24, 2011)

i have eight classes

three give homework. xD


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## Tailsy (Nov 24, 2011)

When I was in high school, we used to wriggle our way out of doing homework by pushing the due date further and further forward until he eventually just gave up on us doing anything.

I think I wrote one essay in Advanced Higher English. :D! I used to do that for Maths, too, but I did actually fail that subject so it's probably not a good idea to just sit and mess around with your boyfriend's iPod Touch every period.


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## ultraviolet (Nov 24, 2011)

DarkAura said:


> Teachers think that homework prepares them for college, but homework has little effect.


?? College/uni is at least 50% homework or study (inb4 'unless you're an english major' tailsy), so yeah it kind of does prepare you for that. People at college/uni don't give two butts whether you hand in your stuff, so being motivated to do homework or study on your own really is something you need to learn and make a habit out of at school. Your lecturers aren't going to ask you whether you've done  your homework or study and they aren't going to push you to do it - regular studying and homework are at their most important when you're in college/uni because they actually do help when you're studying regularly, not just cramming (which is what most people do).



Twilight Sparkle said:


> I used to do that for Maths, too, but I  did actually fail that subject so it's probably not a good idea to just  sit and mess around with your boyfriend's iPod Touch every  period.


fun story: I did no homework/study for my entire maths unit in highschool and finished with something like 28% in the tertiary entrance exam (this is also because I barely grasp maths as it is but hey)


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## DarkAura (Nov 24, 2011)

No, school prepares you for college. Ok yeah, it's good to make a habit out of turning your stuff in, but a study shows that homework has little effect on making you better prepared for college. By homework, I mean the actually homework, what you do on the homework. What you do on the homework doesn't really make you smarter since you already know it in school. (unless you dont grasp the situation)

I have to read hundreds of pages a week for homework. Well, I do love reading, but still. Actually, my school might give out alot of homework, but if they do, I usually just do it on a bus, xD.


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## Ulqi-chan (Nov 24, 2011)

Legendaryseeker99 said:


> If I didn't get to practice math in my Algebra II homework, I doubt I would understand how to even do the problems
> So even though I'm all BLUUUUHH when I have to do my homework, if I never had any I'd never fully understand the subject


I agree with Seeker on this one. I remember back in the 5th grade I never fully understood how to divide fractions in school, but somehow I got the hang of it while doing the homework. So I probably would've failed Math, =P. 

And now, even though we have a decent amount of homework, I still grasp things better by doing it. 

So yeah, homework _does_ help, but then you sometimes get those out-of-the-blue assignments and have to wing it. Usually it's with reading essays I procrastinate in because I read my on books instead. >~<


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## opaltiger (Nov 24, 2011)

Unless you are inhumanly skilled at maths, you won't do well unless you actually do the work. It's not a matter of knowing what to do, it's a matter of being able to do it comfortably and quickly.

In other subjects I can buy homework being less important, but it still gives you practice at things other than the actual material you're covering - writing essays, for example. Being able to write well in general - not just essays - is very valuable.


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## Tailsy (Nov 24, 2011)

ultraviolet said:


> ?? College/uni is at least 50% homework or study (inb4 'unless you're an english major' tailsy)


Actually, being an English major does consist of a lot of work! You *have* to read all the required reading otherwise you will not understand a _word_ of the lectures, and considering I have to read about, oh, 8 books a module, that's quite a task even though I only do three modules a trimester. You have to be able to speak articulately and comment intelligently on the reading in seminars, because that *also* counts for your overall mark, and you need to be able to condense your knowledge into a relatively short space and still sound like a clever clogs. It's pretty difficult, if you think about it! 

Of course I don't read half of the books and do all my essays the night before (LIKE RIGHT NOW :D). But I'm just a genius who naturally writes well. This will not always work.

And yeah you do actually have to work hard for Maths. I drew a cat on my exam paper. That was how much work I did. I don't think I answered any question in paper 2.


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## RosesBones (Nov 24, 2011)

At my school it typically varies depending on what teachers you get. Two of my current teachers give quite a bit of homework, which really sucks as I now have to choose between getting all of it done and having free time.

My English teacher giving that much homework I don't typically mind, as it is reasonable, but my AP Bio teacher has no clue what is reasonable. I think her problem is that she wants to assign as much homework as if it were an actual college course, not realizing that we have five other classes that both assign work and take up our whole days. Although we never get any work back from her, so I don't know if it's affecting people's grades at all.

Homework does help, as it is needed to practice whatever subject (especially Math), but when there's far too much of it it can become impossible to learn anything.


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## Adriane (Nov 24, 2011)

DarkAura said:


> No, school prepares you for college. Ok yeah, it's good to make a habit out of turning your stuff in, but a study shows that homework has little effect on making you better prepared for college. By homework, I mean the actually homework, what you do on the homework. What you do on the homework doesn't really make you smarter since you already know it in school. (unless you dont grasp the situation)


It's difficult to truly understand lecture material in most fields of study without actively working through it yourself. This is why we have homework and lab periods, and you can only fit so much into a 50 minute timeframe.

That's not to say it's not possible to have excessive, superfluous workloads, but having absolutely no homework will leave you totally unprepared for university.


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## Murkrow (Nov 24, 2011)

In school homework just felt like practise for exams we would have for another half a year anyway, since the teachers basically knew what were coming up in exams and just made us do example questions over and over as homework. While not a bad thing, learning material just for the exam isn't exactly the best way to go about it, especially since some people can get away with doing no homework the entire year and study the week before the exam and do just as well.

I don't think I got too much homework. I'm the laziest person I know and I managed to get most of them done on time! Though I'm not sure how I'd know if it was too little work or not.
And since people are talking about maths, I feel the homework isn't there to make you understand really, it was mainly there to get you in practice. While repeating something over and over isn't the best method of learning (since learning how to derive something is a better skill to have than just memory) it does help a lot when it comes to stuff like trig identities. I don't really want to waste time in an exam trying to remember how cot relates to cosec relate to each other by deriving it, I much prefer it being second nature, which homework does help with.

Anyway yeah, I didn't get too much homework or anything. So far uni homework doesn't seem that much either (silly me, I'm supposed to be doing some right now!) but I'm sure it'll pick up sooner or later. It is hard enough that I'm looking back to school work and finding it funny that that was work.


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## Luxcario (Nov 24, 2011)

DarkAura said:


> Did you know that homework has little effect on achievement?


Whoa...is that really true? I'm guessing it is.


			
				DarkAura said:
			
		

> So, does your school give out too much homework, or too little?


Well, my maths teacher doesn't like homework, he just gives it out so that the parents don't complain and stuff. But at our school in fifth grade, I get quite a bit of homework.

But our Christmas play is coming up soon, so all our homework is learning song words. :3


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## Zero Moment (Nov 24, 2011)

Throwing Stars said:


> Whoa...is that really true?


Nope

Read all the posts in here from us people in highschool/college/uni.


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## shadow_lugia (Nov 24, 2011)

I definitely get far too much homework. We have math homework after every class, including right now on Thanksgiving break. We also tend to have a lot of "if you don't get this done in class then it's homework" assignments, which I usually finish, but it would be pretty annoying if I was any slower. I also have to write a speech on a subject that I don't particularly care about this weekend.

Also, we're supposed to read in Spanish for an hour each week for Spanish III, but I think the teacher forgot about that. Shh.


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## Superbird (Nov 24, 2011)

DarkAura said:


> No, school prepares you for college. Ok yeah, it's good to make a habit out of turning your stuff in, but a study shows that homework has little effect on making you better prepared for college. By homework, I mean the actually homework, what you do on the homework. What you do on the homework doesn't really make you smarter since you already know it in school. (unless you dont grasp the situation)


As people above said, homework gets you in the habit of studying regularly, which is absolutely necessary when you get to later schooling and college, or else you will fail. And like Seeker above, if my teachers didn't give out homework, I probably wouldn't score half as well on the tests; homework also reinforces your knowledge of the subject. And yes, you do already know what the homework tests. But for most people homework is necessary to remind them, and reinforce the concept in their head, as well as for practice. Practice is always good.



DarkAura said:


> I have to read hundreds of pages a week for homework. Well, I do love reading, but still. Actually, my school might give out alot of homework, but if they do, I usually just do it on a bus, xD.


You think _reading_ hundreds of pages is bad? Try _annotating_ them. Pure torture. For my English class, anyway.



Throwing Stars said:


> Well, my maths teacher doesn't like homework, he just gives it out so that the parents don't complain and stuff. But at our school in fifth grade, I get quite a bit of homework.


Don't talk until you get to middle school. Elementary school really does not count.


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## bulbasaur (Nov 24, 2011)

Superbird said:


> As people above said, homework gets you in the habit of studying regularly, which is absolutely necessary when you get to later schooling and college, or else you will fail. And like Seeker above, if my teachers didn't give out homework, I probably wouldn't score half as well on the tests; homework also reinforces your knowledge of the subject. And yes, you do already know what the homework tests. But for most people homework is necessary to remind them, and reinforce the concept in their head, as well as for practice. Practice is always good.


It's when teachers give homework for the sake of homework, and excessive homework, where things really start to fall apart - but then, they really have no choice because my parents, like so many other High Expectations Asian parents, get really angry if there's no homework. He even influenced the council enough to give my English teacher a negative review just because I wasn't getting homework from her.



Superbird said:


> Don't talk until you get to middle school. Elementary school really does not count.


This. Also, if I may add, middle school is like nothing when compared to grades 11 and 12 (junior and senior).


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## Vipera Magnifica (Nov 25, 2011)

There's a fine line between actual homework and mindless busywork. Some work will actually help prepare you for college, but pointless assignments wont.


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## DarkAura (Nov 25, 2011)

Hmm... those scientists who said homework doesn't do much shouldn't even be scientists...

Homework doesn't really do anything for me though. I grasp very subject perfectly. =\


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## Superbird (Nov 25, 2011)

But other people don't. They have to give those people a chance.


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## Cerberus87 (Nov 25, 2011)

I never did homework back in school (that's not entirely true though) and I still managed to get graduated in uni so homework doesn't necessarily help.

What I hated the most, however, was studying for exams. I still do. This is something I must fix on myself.


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## Wildstyle (Nov 25, 2011)

I find that some home work helps but a lot of the math work is tiresome and silly.

I know repetition is needed to memorize stuff in math but doing the same question 20 times slightly changed is silly and just bores me.

A) to T) with 2-3 questions each -_- for question 1


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## Eta Carinae (Nov 25, 2011)

I understand how important homework is and all that, I just despise doing it.  Because of this I will procrastinate on _everything_, and usually come out OK.  The only subject that that doesn't work in very well is my English class.  It's a "Challenge" English class, which means it's for a group of us 28 kids who had to pass a test, write an essay, etc. to get in.  About half of us are designated "Gifted" by the government, while most of the rest never took the test that would give them that title.  Because of that, the class, though for a bunch of ninth graders, focuses mainly on the twelfth grade curriculum, and advances the same way, meaning that our twelfth grade class will focus mainly on skills learned in third year university.  Fun.


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## Crazy Linoone (Nov 25, 2011)

DarkAura said:


> Homework doesn't really do anything for me though. I grasp very subject perfectly. =\


Try being in high school. 



DarkAura said:


> Did you know that homework has little effect on achievement? If you don't have homework, it doesn't make too much of a difference.


What do you mean by "achievement"? How is it measured? How was the study conducted? I'm not going to believe you until you cite your sources.


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## DarkAura (Nov 26, 2011)

It was from some educational magazine my stupid teacher had us read. Umm, It had the initials TFK on it.


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## Crazy Linoone (Nov 26, 2011)

DarkAura said:


> It was from some educational magazine my stupid teacher had us read. Umm, It had the initials TFK on it.


Okay, so I did some googling. It seems like the verdict is pretty mixed on whether homework helps students or not, but most studies agree that more homework is associated with better test scores for older students (> elementary):

Some Relevant Links 

Even though I dislike doing homework, I must conclude that doing them is probably beneficial if I want good grades. Having good grades also mean that I will more likely be accepted by a good college*, which generally associates with higher starting salaries. 

And now, off to procrastinate some more do homework. 

*Since I live in an affluent area in the US and don't exactly have exceptional extracurricular activities or awards


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## ultraviolet (Nov 26, 2011)

Twilight Sparkle said:


> Actually, being an English major does consist of a lot of work! You *have* to read all the required reading otherwise you will not understand a _word_ of the lectures, and considering I have to read about, oh, 8 books a module, that's quite a task even though I only do three modules a trimester. You have to be able to speak articulately and comment intelligently on the reading in seminars, because that *also* counts for your overall mark, and you need to be able to condense your knowledge into a relatively short space and still sound like a clever clogs. It's pretty difficult, if you think about it!
> 
> Of course I don't read half of the books and do all my essays the night before (LIKE RIGHT NOW :D). But I'm just a genius who naturally writes well. This will not always work.


oh I totally agree! but I was just pre-empting the oncoming 'unless you're ME!' :D I took _one _english unit and I had seven books to read, so.


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## M&F (Nov 26, 2011)

DarkAura said:


> Hmm... those scientists who said homework doesn't do much shouldn't even be scientists...


They might not be, depending on your source.
(edit: didn't see a few posts where the source is actually cited; can't be bothered to look over it now)

Anyways. During my school years, I've mastered the technique of wriggling my way out of getting any homework done. Now, I'm facing entry exams (note that where I live the equivalent to SATs mean nothing; for one they'd have to stop being annulated every year because some asshole somewhere cheated) and I can't spend three hours focused on studying for them. Whether these two facts are correlated and what correlation they share exactly would be for somebody smarter than I am to figure out.


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## Zero Moment (Nov 26, 2011)

Metallica Fanboy said:


> They might not be, depending on your source.
> (edit: didn't see a few posts where the source is actually cited; can't be bothered to look over it now)
> 
> Anyways. During my school years, I've mastered the technique of wriggling my way out of getting any homework done. Now, I'm facing entry exams (note that where I live the equivalent to SATs mean nothing; for one they'd have to stop being annulated every year because some asshole somewhere cheated) and I can't spend three hours focused on studying for them. Whether these two facts are correlated and what correlation they share exactly would be for somebody smarter than I am to figure out.


It seems that the lack of homework left you without the focus neccessary for the task at hand. Long hours spent on homework would likely have increased your ability to concentrate. Therefore, these cupcakes are delicious and taste like murder.


........

I mean what


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## Autumn (Dec 3, 2011)

bulbasaur said:


> This. Also, if I may add, middle school is like nothing when compared to grades 11 and 12 (junior and senior).


I've never had a _lot_ of homework but probably my worst year in terms of it was grade 11. Now that I'm a senior and only three of my classes give homework (one of those classes, I must add, is _music theory_ so I actually find the homework _fun_) i don't have to worry about anything :V cept the bullshit _senior exit project_ but not til 2012


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